Career Clinic

This section provides useful information & advice for everyone interested in a career in the care sector. Whether you need tips on interview techniques or are looking for the best routes to a career in care, you'll find it here.

Mothers of young children are losing out on over a billion pounds in earnings each year, according to a charity. Save the Children warned that mothers are missing out on millions daily due to "a childcare system that feels stacked against them". The charity used available government figures to look…

Skills Development Scotland (SDS) has highlighted a need for the nation’s Early Learning and Childcare sector to attract a more diverse workforce to create an additional 11,000 jobs by 2020 to meet expected demand. SDS has worked with partners to create new national Early Learning and Childcare Skills Investment Plan…

Recruiting more men and ethnic minority staff could help the childcare sector find the 11,000 new workers it needs to fulfil a flagship Scottish Government pledge to double the hours of free care. Ministers have committed to increasing the amount of funded childcare for eligible two-year-olds as well as all…

A free child care policy may be extended to include foster families, Education Secretary Justine Greening has revealed. Under the current policy three and four-year-olds in families where all parents work are entitled to 30 hours free care, but children in foster care are not included. At education questions Ms…

Highlands and Islands MSP Maree Todd will be appointed as the new minister for childcare and early years following the resignation of Mark McDonald over "inappropriate'' behaviour. First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced her intention to promote Ms Todd days after Mr McDonald stepped down from the role with an apology…

A Scottish Government minister has resigned over past actions he said had been "considered to be inappropriate". Mark McDonald, the SNP minister for childcare and early years, apologised "to anyone I have upset" as he stepped down from the role. The MSP for Aberdeen Donside said previous behaviour he had…

Low pay and a lack of affordable childcare are holding back parents who want to work, a study has found. Research by the Child Poverty Action Group showed that one in five unemployed parents wanted to work but found the cost of childcare prohibitively expensive. Almost as many could not…

New job-seeking requirements placed on parents of young children under Universal Credit risk pushing single-parent families into poverty, a report warns. A study by campaign group Gingerbread suggested that 165,000 single parents of pre-school aged children are at increased risk of going into poverty and debt because of new conditions…

Resigning with class!

How to resign diplomatically

Are you preparing to resign from your current job? Some job seekers have a hard time doing so, either because they love the job and their colleagues or because they can't stand the job and can't wait to leave.